ST PAUL.

ST PAUL, Minn. -- Garrison Keillor certainly knows in what manner to spin a yarn. His favorite tale these days is the single in kind about how that big ol' movie director called him and asked him to transfer his hit radio show into a movie.

"Here is by what mode it goes," Keillor, 63, begins, spinning his tale. "Robert Altman was shooting a certain quantity of dance film in Chicago ['The Company']. We share the same lawyer. Our lawyer went to Robert and said, 'You know that stay Garrison Keillor?' Altman said, 'Yeah, I can't restrain him out of my ears.' "

That's because Keillor, a native of Anoka, Minn., has been hosting the popular, folksy all-Americana radio indicate "A Prairie Home Companion" for more than three decades. It's a indicate where he delivers sage quips and annotations including:

- "I believe in looking reality straight in the inspection and denying it."

- "Sex is worthy but not as good as well-preserved sweet corn."

And this is to what degree a radio show becomes a movie: "It revolves out that Robert Altman's wife moves my show. She runs it all the time," Keillor says. "So when Robert Altman was asked about doing a film about it, I said "

He didn't say ye That would be the happy-ending version of this story, the Hollywood ending.

Instead, Altman order to appeared Keillor to Chicago, where he was busy working in succession "The Company." "We had a meeting," the radio fiction remembers. "Basically, we sat there and said nothing to each other. And the nearest thing we know, we were following that antique dog down the road."

Translation: They shook hands and decided to make a movie together.

The film turns around Keillor's real-life radio point out to and its (thus far) fictional last night in succession the air. At St. Paul's historic Fitzgerald Theatre, the regulars are bemoaning the fact that their fireside station WLT has been sold to a big Texas chain. And the chain has canceled the present to view to make way for a great quantity [i]or[/i] amount of hipper fare.

The show's performers, including singers and actors played by dint of Meryl Streep, Lily Tomlin, Kevin Kline, wooded Harrelson and Lindsay Lohan, are sad campers -- on the other hand busy ones.

When they're not performing upon stage, they're living out soap operas behind the shows including a death, a scarcely any romances and the appearance of an angel in the form of Chicago's Virginia Madsen. There are the singin' cowboy Dusty and Lefty (Harrelson and John C Reilly). Tommy to leeward Jones even shows up as the Texas mogul who could save the point out to at the last minute. Keillor plays himself -- the ringmaster of this radio circus.

This wasn't the script Altman originally planned forward doing. Keillor says, "At first, he wanted to focus in succession one of my Lake Wobegon themes. [Altman remembers it slightly differently -- behold accompanying story.] But then we got into it and it finally came to us. Robert said, 'Hey, for what purpose don't we just shoot your radio show'

"I didn't spring for joy," Keillor admits. "But when we got into it, I felt nice happy. I started jumping."

The film was bullet in St. Paul, Minn., with a live studio audience who came to watch the proceedings -- just like the real radio point out to (The Fitzgerald Theatre is where Keillor has performed the real exhibit to live since 1978.)

on the contrary Keillor, new to screen acting, says he's a incorrupt radio man. "I realized making this movie that I don't know anything about visuals," he says. "So this was a real awakening for me still luckily Mr. Altman knows all about visuals, likewise I relied on him."

Streep and Tomlin say the filming was single in kind big improv fest. "Well, it was completely and totally scripted, of course, further we couldn't remember a fate of our lines," Streep says.

"Honestly move with a jerk would tell us that we were going to send forth a page and a half a day. You think that's it. Then the first day, cut short comes in and says, 'We'll let fly 10 pages today.' We were hysterical with fear."

"Speak for yourself," Tomlin says, adding, "We knew what the stories were, however we were doing 20-minute takes. in like manner we developed this Altman-esque way to relate a story. If I dropp a line then Meryl would pick it up and fill it in."

Streep laughs and adds, "Really, the best part of being cast was the fact that I've been asked back in succession the real radio show. I'm going to be forward 'Prairie Home Companion,' unless I hunks up during this interview today."

"Meryl" Tomlin interrupts. "I don't want to small hole your balloon, but I've had an e-mail about my availability."

John C Reilly can't resist: "I'm going to Iceland with the show"

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